I feel the same. I wished all of Cole's stories were at least as long as War And Peace. I just do not want to part with the characters Cole develops so well. And he does that not only with the protagonists, the baddies are as life-like and complex as the rest as his newest story shows.
But there is another thing that draws me to Cole's stories and that's the protagonists' personalities. They are honest boys, good at heart. Pretending to be someone they are not is hard for them. And yet they struggle to be the person they falsely believe society expects them to be.
Cole's messages to young readers 'You have no reason to be ashamed of yourself. Be true to yourself. Do not try to be someone other people want you to be.' and from there 'Stand up for yourself. Ask for help. Make friends.' did help me immensely in my life, even when I was not a young reader anymore.
To be fair, there are a lot great writers here on awesomedude, who develop their characters and plots as well and I enjoy reading their stories very much. I wished some of them would write more and I would have more time to read more.
Because I consider myself still awesomedude-forum-illiterate and don't know how to open a new thread I just wanted to add something here I found on Zeit online, a German weekly, I wanted to share. I think it has the potential of a beginning of a great story if it wasn't bitter reality for one of the persons described. It is an article about a 15 year old Syrian refugee, an orphan, stuck in Istanbul, Turkey and his best friend who managed to make it to central Europe.
"Wie kann Angela Merkel uns das antun?"
Auf seinem Handy hat Kalil ein Foto von seinem besten Freund Rafaat. Es zeigt den 16-jährige Syrer, wie er in der Münchner Allianz Arena den FC Bayern anfeuert. Rafaat hat die Vereinsfarben auf seine Wange gemalt und lacht. Kalil schaut traurig auf das Bild, und sagt mit leiser Stimme: "Die Europäer können sich abschotten, so sehr sie wollen, ich werde es trotzdem irgendwie zu meinem Freund nach Deutschland schaffen."
(How can Angela Merkel do this to us?
On his mobile phone Kalil has a picture of his best friend Rafaat. It shows the 16 year old Syrian cheering for the FC Bayern soccer team in the Allianz Arena stadion at Munich, Germany. Rafaat has painted his cheeks in the team's colours and he is laughing. With a sad expression Kalil looks at the picture and then says with a small voice: 'The Europeans can try to wall themselves in as much as they want to. I will somehow make it to my friend in Germany.')
The article then goes on to describe the miserable conditions Kalil and other Syrian refugees are living in Istanbul. There is no happy ending although I hope the journalist made an effort to help Kalil. I found this article very moving and I hope there will be a mobile phone, a 'Handy', in the future showing the picture of a laughing Kalil, re-united with his best friend...